Background

Notes and format last updated May 7, 2020

Starting on the May 7th update, the NY Times began including probable covid cases/deaths along with confirmed. This mostly affects death counts – for certain geographies that include probable COVID deaths in addition to confirmed, these are now added to the totals. For the time being, they were all added to the May 6th totals, causing a big spike at the U.S. level. Over time, NY Times will revise their historical counts and distribute these added deaths when they actually occurred, so the spike should fade.

Growth rates

Heat maps

  • The two heat maps below compare how quickly total cases or deaths have grown at various times in our respective geopgraphies.
  • The first plot compares growth rate for total cases; the second, growth rate for total deaths.
  • The metric used is doubling time, by which I mean how quickly total cases or deaths are doubling.
  • The plots track that doubling time at each date for our geographies. Darker colors reflect shorter doubling times, and thus periods of faster growth.
    • You can use the plots to track each geography over time and to compare the geographies to one another.
    • You can also compare the cases and death charts, to see how faster periods of death growth follow faster periods of case growth.

Case growth rates

  • This section charts the growth rate of both total and new cases for each of our respective geographies. Each geography has its own chart, and then that chart will have a trendline for total cases and new cases.
    • There are only plots for the U.S. and states because the numbers for the counties are too small to generate worthwhile trendlines in this section.
  • Note that we’re charting growth rate and not a count of cases, so don’t think of these as the standard “curve” that we hear about in the news and that we want to flatten. Instead, these growth rate charts help track more precisely what we can only estimate when we see those other curves. For these growth rate charts, if the line is above zero, the metric we are tracking (total or new cases) is continuing to grow. If the growth rate line is going up, it’s growing more quickly each day; if it’s going down but still above zero, it’s growing less quickly (but still growing). Only when the growth rate lines go below zero has the metric stopped growing.
  • Each of these two lines uses rolling windows to calculate a growth rate for that particular metric. I do the calculation differently for each to smooth out some of the large day-to-day discrepancies in new case reporting at the state level.
    • For total cases, the trendlines are a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rates in total cases. We want to see these decline (and almost all are), but they can’t go below zero. This is because we’re tracking growth rate and a growth rate line below zero would mean total cases have gone down, which can’t happen. They can only grow less quickly, which means we want to see the total case line get as close to zero as possible.
    • For new cases, the trendlines show a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rate in the rolling 7-day average of new cases. Including two rolling periods in this average helps smooth out crazy spikes at the state level that result from large day-to-day changes. Unlike the lines for total cases, we want to watch for the lines for new cases to get consistently below zero and stay there. That means that we are consistently seeing fewer new cases on a daily basis.

U.S.

Our states

Death growth rates

  • This section charts the growth rate of both total and new deaths for each of our respective geographies. Each geography has its own chart, and then that chart will have a trendline for total deaths and new deaths.
    • There are only plots for the U.S. and states because the numbers for the counties are too small to generate worthwhile trendlines in this section.
  • Note that we’re charting growth rate and not a count of deaths, so don’t think of these as the standard “curve” that we hear about in the news and that we want to flatten. Instead, these growth rate charts help track more precisely what we can only estimate when we see those other curves. For these growth rate charts, if the line is above zero, the metric we are tracking (total or new deaths) is continuing to grow. If the growth rate line is going up, it’s growing more quickly each day; if it’s going down but still above zero, it’s growing less quickly (but still growing). Only when the growth rate lines go below zero has the metric stopped growing.
  • Each of these two lines uses rolling windows to calculate a growth rate for that particular metric. I do the calculation differently for each to smooth out some of the large day-to-day discrepancies in new death reporting at the state level.
    • For total deaths, the trendlines are a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rates in total deaths. We want to see these decline (and almost all are), but they can’t go below zero. This is because we’re tracking growth rate and a growth rate line below zero would mean total deaths have gone down, which can’t happen. They can only grow less quickly, which means we want to see the total death line get as close to zero as possible.
    • For new deaths, the trendlines show a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rate in the rolling 7-day average of new deaths. Including two rolling periods in this average helps smooth out crazy spikes at the state level that result from large day-to-day changes. Unlike the lines for total deaths, we want to watch for the lines for new deaths to get consistently below zero and stay there. That means that we are consistently seeing fewer new deaths on a daily basis.

U.S.

Our states

By population rankings

This section tracks metrics for states and counties normalized for population (number of cases or deaths per million residents), and then compares these figures both for our geographies and the country overall.

States

  • This section shows tables ranking all 50 states for per populations rates of total cases, new cases, total deaths, and new deaths.
  • For each metric, in addition to the tables, the trends for the top states are plotted over time.
    • We only plot the top ten states for each metric so that the plots aren’t too crowded. But you can view the full 50-state rankings in the tables.

Total confirmed cases

Table of total confirmed cases per million residents (all 50 states)
Ranking State Cases Per Million
1 North Dakota 128,918
2 South Dakota 123,866
3 Rhode Island 113,174
4 Utah 111,460
5 Arizona 108,572
6 Tennessee 107,713
7 Iowa 103,662
8 Wisconsin 103,609
9 Oklahoma 103,039
10 Arkansas 102,703
11 Nebraska 100,754
12 Kansas 98,826
13 Alabama 97,093
14 Indiana 96,027
15 Mississippi 95,342
16 Idaho 93,256
17 Nevada 92,814
18 South Carolina 91,894
19 Wyoming 91,357
20 Illinois 91,210
21 Montana 90,456
22 Louisiana 89,203
23 Texas 87,325
24 California 87,309
25 Georgia 87,304
26 Kentucky 86,631
27 New Mexico 85,266
28 Florida 83,727
29 Delaware 83,655
30 Minnesota 83,333
31 New Jersey 82,487
32 Missouri 82,367
33 Massachusetts 79,643
34 Ohio 79,444
35 New York 77,328
36 North Carolina 77,287
37 Alaska 76,141
38 Connecticut 74,466
39 Colorado 71,262
40 West Virginia 70,279
41 Pennsylvania 69,216
42 Virginia 62,950
43 Michigan 62,550
44 Maryland 60,678
45 District of Columbia 54,336
46 New Hampshire 50,927
47 Washington 43,105
48 Puerto Rico 40,739
49 Oregon 35,202
50 Maine 31,158
51 Vermont 21,029
52 Hawaii 18,721

New confirmed cases

Table of new cases per million residents: rolling 3-day average (all 50 states)
Ranking State New Cases Per Million
1 Rhode Island 629
2 Connecticut 572
3 South Carolina 438
4 Arizona 430
5 Kentucky 430
6 Texas 428
7 New York 408
8 New Jersey 394
9 Kansas 383
10 Alaska 374
11 Arkansas 353
12 North Carolina 339
13 Virginia 319
14 Oklahoma 317
15 Florida 315
16 Georgia 310
17 Tennessee 303
18 Delaware 296
19 Utah 283
20 California 275
21 Pennsylvania 274
22 Montana 269
23 Iowa 261
24 Idaho 260
25 Alabama 247
26 Massachusetts 242
27 Ohio 239
28 Mississippi 232
29 West Virginia 231
30 New Hampshire 212
31 Louisiana 206
32 New Mexico 196
33 Nevada 188
34 Washington 188
35 Nebraska 183
36 Illinois 180
37 Indiana 178
38 Missouri 168
39 Maryland 166
40 Maine 164
41 Colorado 155
42 Michigan 148
43 District of Columbia 147
44 Wyoming 142
45 Wisconsin 141
46 South Dakota 132
47 Vermont 118
48 Oregon 106
49 Minnesota 105
50 Puerto Rico 68
51 North Dakota 27
52 Hawaii 25

Total deaths

Table of total deaths per million residents (all 50 states)
Ranking State Deaths Per Million
1 New Jersey 2,498
2 New York 2,305
3 Massachusetts 2,206
4 Mississippi 2,139
5 Rhode Island 2,132
6 Connecticut 2,054
7 South Dakota 2,051
8 Arizona 1,993
9 Louisiana 1,981
10 North Dakota 1,914
11 Alabama 1,812
12 Indiana 1,782
13 Pennsylvania 1,780
14 Illinois 1,725
15 Arkansas 1,714
16 New Mexico 1,651
17 Iowa 1,639
18 Michigan 1,594
19 Tennessee 1,555
20 South Carolina 1,503
21 Nevada 1,488
22 Kansas 1,477
23 Georgia 1,409
24 Texas 1,389
25 District of Columbia 1,367
26 Florida 1,313
27 Delaware 1,278
28 Missouri 1,239
29 Montana 1,235
30 Maryland 1,231
31 West Virginia 1,213
32 Wisconsin 1,152
33 California 1,149
34 Minnesota 1,132
35 Wyoming 1,117
36 Nebraska 1,083
37 Colorado 1,018
38 Ohio 1,014
39 Idaho 1,003
40 Oklahoma 985
41 North Carolina 975
42 Kentucky 971
43 New Hampshire 820
44 Virginia 812
45 Washington 613
46 Puerto Rico 593
47 Utah 550
48 Oregon 488
49 Maine 476
50 Alaska 367
51 Vermont 299
52 Hawaii 296

New deaths

Table of new deaths per million residents: rolling 3-day average (all 50 states)
Ranking State New Deaths Per Million
1 Alabama 25
2 Kansas 23
3 Arizona 20
4 Rhode Island 14
5 Wyoming 13
6 Delaware 12
7 Tennessee 12
8 Arkansas 10
9 California 10
10 Connecticut 10
11 Georgia 10
12 Massachusetts 10
13 Mississippi 10
14 Indiana 9
15 New Mexico 9
16 Texas 9
17 Kentucky 8
18 West Virginia 8
19 Florida 7
20 New Jersey 7
21 New York 7
22 Oklahoma 7
23 Pennsylvania 7
24 District of Columbia 6
25 Iowa 6
26 Louisiana 6
27 Nevada 6
28 North Carolina 6
29 Virginia 6
30 Washington 6
31 Maryland 5
32 Ohio 5
33 South Carolina 5
34 Wisconsin 5
35 Idaho 4
36 Nebraska 4
37 Illinois 3
38 Utah 3
39 Colorado 2
40 Michigan 2
41 Missouri 2
42 New Hampshire 2
43 North Dakota 2
44 Oregon 2
45 South Dakota 2
46 Vermont 2
47 Hawaii 1
48 Maine 1
49 Minnesota 1
50 Montana 1
51 Puerto Rico 1
52 Alaska 0

Counties

  • This section focuses on the county level. It shows tables with our counties ranked by percentile of U.S. counties for per population rates of total cases and total deaths.
    • Each table also shows the top five counties in the country in addition to our counties, for added perspecive.
  • In addition to the tables, our counties’ percentile for both total cases and total deaths are plotted over time.

Confirmed cases

Table showing total cases per million and percentile for all US counties. Includes our counties and the top 5 in the US for perspective.
County State Cases Per Million Raw Ranking Percentile
Crowley Colorado 310,840 1 99
Chattahoochee Georgia 260,567 2 99
Lincoln Arkansas 238,560 3 99
Bent Colorado 238,121 4 99
Dewey South Dakota 235,913 5 99
Davidson Tennessee 125,101 229 92
Richland South Carolina 90,928 1288 59
York South Carolina 84,647 1613 48
Orange California 80,114 1830 41
Pierce Washington 40,319 2899 7

Our county percentiles over time

Deaths

Table showing total deaths per million and percentile for all US counties. Includes our counties and the top 5 in the US for perspective.
County State Deaths Per Million Raw Ranking Percentile
Gove Kansas 8,346 1 99
Jerauld South Dakota 7,948 2 99
Buffalo South Dakota 6,626 3 99
Dickey North Dakota 6,568 4 99
Emporia city Virginia 6,547 5 99
Davidson Tennessee 1,150 1897 39
Richland South Carolina 1,099 1959 37
Orange California 1,087 1975 37
York South Carolina 989 2111 32
Pierce Washington 554 2674 14

Our county percentiles over time

Raw counts

Total confirmed cases

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

New confirmed cases

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

Total deaths

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

New deaths

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

Stay-at-home comparisons